


Honoring Promises

by LananiA3O



Series: Batfam Week 2018 [2]
Category: Batman - All Media Types, Nightwing (Comics)
Genre: Batfam Week 2018, Death Threats, Dick gets some therapy, Discussions of Canonical Character Death, Fix-it fic, Gen, Homecoming, Hurt/Comfort, Nightwing: Brothers In Blood, PTSD, Reconciliation, Swearing, Victim-blaming, and a reality check, and decides to go and help Jason, bruce is an ass, not necessarily in that order though, rejection of victim-blaming
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-07-31
Updated: 2018-07-31
Packaged: 2019-06-11 17:07:55
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 14,705
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15320190
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/LananiA3O/pseuds/LananiA3O
Summary: Following his disastrous confrontration with Jason in New York, Dick can't get the note Jason sent him upon leaving out of his head. He talks it over with his psychiatrist friend Clancy and comes to a horrifying realization: it's not emotional manipulation. It's Jason trying to cash in on a promise Dick made to him long ago. A promise to always be there for his little brother.





	Honoring Promises

**Author's Note:**

> Written for Batfam Week 2018, day 3: Homecoming. I had been wanting to write a fix-it fic for Brothers In Blood, aka that one horrible Nightwing storyline where Dick is absolutely OOC and Jason turns into a Canonical Tentacle Monster, for quite a while now. This seemed like a good opportunity. In true Lanani fashion, I had planned this one to be 4k long... oh dear...  
> Mood song for this fic: Florence and the Machine - Hiding  
> Google searches: Biochemistry curriculums  
> Also, lots of re-reading of Brothers in Blood *ugh*
> 
> Bonus points for anyone who realizes what Jason's registration number symbolizes.
> 
> For status updates, writing trivia, fandom/fanfiction/writing related questions and occasional random ramblings, please visit [my tumblr](http://lananiscorner.tumblr.com/).

_„Dear Dickie-bird.“_

„Stop!“ The words drilled into his skull, letter by letter, boring deeper, until it felt like his brain was splitting apart.

_“I survived and I’m all back to normal, in case you’re interested.”_

“I’m not!” He really wasn’t. He wasn’t going to have this guilt trip. Not from someone who killed without hesitation, without regret. Not from someone who had beaten Tim into a pulp.

_“Leaving town to find my own way. Thanks for coming for me, brother.”_

“Stop. Calling. Me. That!” He was not going to have this guilt trip. He was _not_.

_“I know we don’t agree on much.”_

“We agree on absolutely nothing!” Dick shouted into the void, even though he knew it wasn’t going to matter. The person who needed to hear those words was not here. Even if he were, Dick doubted he’d listen. Jason had always been rash and stubborn and too over-confident for his own good.

_“I just wanted to believe we could be a family again.”_

“Stop. Just stop, stop, stop, STOP!” He wanted to wake up now. Dick knew it was a dream, because it was Cheyenne who had read that note to him, yet right now he heard Jason. Cheyenne wasn’t here. No-one was here. He was—where was he anyway?

Dick’s mind crawled back into the world of the awake and living long before his body did, forcing him to watch the brown recluse on the other side of the room as it crawled behind the TV and to listen to the water from the kitchen sink tap drip and drip and drip and drip against the cold metal until he felt ready to go insane.

When his body finally complied and his feet finally moved, Dick dashed out of bed and sprinted for the trash can.

The note was at the very bottom, beneath a pile of dust and crumpled receipts and the leftovers of almost two weeks of Chinese take-out. He ditched it in the sink and retrieved the matchbox from the utility closet. The match came to life with a dedicated swish and Dick felt relief at the sight of the little flame dancing of its end. He should have done this two weeks ago.

And yet he couldn’t. Dick cursed through his teeth as he dropped the whittled down match into the sink and crushed the untouched paper in his fist. This goddamn telegram was a guilt trip. Nothing more. Nightwing did not fall for guilt trips. He was better than that.

What was Jason trying to gain from sending him this anyway? Outside of making Dick feel like trash? Or was that the only point? Was that why he had not destroyed this useless, little piece of paper when he had first gotten it? Why? Just... why? Clancy always said that asking questions upon questions was the only way to find answers, but—

“Clancy...”

***

She was home late, as always. Dick wasn’t surprised. Judging from the way her eyebrows rose in amusement when she saw him sitting on the window sill, she wasn’t surprised about his visit either.

“If we’re going to make this therapy session a regular thing, maybe I _should_ charge you.”

“This will be the last time, Clancy.” He hoped. Dead God, he hoped it would be the last time. Dealing with Jason had been exhausting. Breaking up with Cheyenne had ripped open old wounds. He was so beyond ready for finally having some peace and quiet. Some stability and a sense of... normality. “You remember Jason?”

“Of course I do.” She offered him a drink. Dick declined. Then, Clancy sat back on her couch, put her feet up on the table, and started sipping from her cup of freshly brewed tea, looking like the most relaxed person in the world. She wasn’t. Bridget Clancy was still working. Because of him.

“He’s finally left town. And he sent me this.” He handed her the note and was just about to talk, when she spit out her tea.

“Jesus Christ, Grayson, did you dig that out of a dumpster?”

“My trash can,” Dick admitted sourly, “and I’m sorry about the smell, but I really need a second opinion here. I haven’t had a good night of sleep since he sent me this.”

Apparently, that was enough to ring the alarm bells in Clancy’s head. She nodded, put down her tea and started reading. Dick tried to analyze her reaction, but there was nothing there. No knitting of brows, no grinding teeth, no hard swallowing. Perhaps he should have known better – she was a psychiatrist after all, but the fact that she read the piece of paper that had kept him half-awake for two weeks like it was a page from a phone book seemed almost insulting.

When she was done, Clancy put the note neatly onto the table and took up her tea again. Dick sighed.

“So?”

“So...” Clancy took a deep breath. “What’s your take?”

“My take?” Dick raised his eyebrows. “I came here looking for your opinion.”

“And I’m not going to give it to you until you give me yours.” Clancy argued. “What’s your take?”

“I think he’s trying to guilt-trip me,” Dick finally admitted after what seemed like an eternity. “He knows I don’t agree with his methods. He knows he did horrible things. He’s trying to make me believe that he’s actually a good guy and that I should feel bad about how I handled him.” It was his best guess anyways. Dick frowned. Jason was two-hundred pounds of unpredictable crazy. Lord only knew what was going on in that deranged mind of his. “Alright. You’ve got my opinion. What’s yours?”

“I think I don’t know nearly enough about your relationship to him before all of this happened to make a qualified statement,” Clancy said over another sip of tea. “He calls you ‘brother’ and says that he wants to be ‘family’ again. You old me before that he is ‘the black sheep of the family’, but are you actually family? You said he should be dead twice over? What happened? What was your relationship like before you he ‘died’?”

Dick groaned. “I should have known you’d answer a question with a question.”

“Yes, you should have.” Suddenly, there was a spark in Clancy’s voice that made his head snap up from where it had tried to meet his palm. The fire in her eyes was unmistakable. Bridget Clancy was pissed. “It’s what a good psychiatrist, or a good therapist for that matter, does. It’s also what a good detective does, so I hope you’d be familiar with the concept. If this was a murder case or missing persons or whatever and you were the cop asking the victim’s brother to describe his relationship with them, wouldn’t you be wanting to get some answers?”

“I would.” Dick admitted and the pang of guilt in his gut was a familiar feeling. _Alright Dick_ , he took a deep breath, _reframe this in your head. You’re the witness. She’s the cop_.

“We are brothers by law, but not by blood.” It was as good a place as any to start. Besides, Clancy already knew his full name and Jason’s too, so there was really no harm in letting that cat out of the bag. “I had left the house long before our father adopted him. I—I did not take his addition to the family very well.”

That was an understatement, although Dick like to give himself credit for the fact that he had directed most of his anger at Bruce, rather than at Jason back then.

“Our dad did not tell him about me. He did not tell me about him. The first time we met, Jason was wearing the suit that had been mine before and screwing up a mission, badly. I yelled at him and stormed off. The next time we met, we reconciled and I’d like to think we parted on good terms. We didn’t talk much after that, but we teamed up once or twice.”

“And how was that?”

“Honestly, I don’t fully remember.” The memory brought a dark, mildly hysterical chuckle out of his throat. “I was brainwashed for most of it, but from what my teammates told me, he did an excellent job and kept his cool when things were going to hell. Even made sure that the most vulnerable members of the team were alright and no-one got hurt.”

Clancy bristled. Dick watched carefully as she got up, retrieved pen and paper from a drawer, and returned to the couch. This time, she sat down cross-legged, scribbling notes in what looked like a personalized mixture of stenography and pictograms. “That doesn’t sound like the black sheep of the family,” Clancy finally said. Under the neutral tone, Dick could hear the tiniest note of accusation. “It certainly doesn’t sound like someone who would try to guilt-trip his own brother. What bothers me the most though, is that he says he wanted ‘to be family again’.”

“Why that of all things?”

“Because from what you are telling me, you barely were a brother to him.” She probably hadn’t meant for it to sound like an insult, but he felt the stab nonetheless. Dick winced.

Okay. Maybe he deserved a bit of the guilt. Yes, he had handed Jason his phone number and had told him he could call anytime, but he certainly hadn’t actively tried to be a brother to him, like he had with Tim. He had never trained together with Jason. He hadn’t met up with him outside of Robin & Nightwing business. He had never asked him if things were still ok at the manor.

“I always assumed he was okay.” It sounded like a lie even as he said it and yet somehow Dick’s brain decided this was a good shovel to use for digging deeper. “I offered him to call me if he wanted. He never did.”

“Did he come from an environment where it would have been acceptable and effective to ask for help?” Clancy made another note and tapped her pencil slowly against the coffee table. “Did your father ever encourage talking? Did his biological parents? Was he a social person, in general? Did he have friends? Because pretty often, children who grow up in abusive, neglective, or even just uncooperative environments don’t bother asking for help until they are at death’s door, because experience has taught them that no-one’s going to care, much less come to help them, anyway.”

 _Shit._ Dick paled. He wanted to slap himself. How—why? How had he gone all these years without even considering this as a factor? He was Nightwing, for Christ’s sake! How could he have been so sloppy?

“His father was a crook and a deadbeat at best...” Oh God, he was gonna have to dig into GCPD’s files on Willis Todd after this and he doubted he would like what he would find. “His mother was an addict and OD’d while his dad was in jail. He lived on the streets for a few months until our dad took him in.”

“And your dad...?”

“Has all the emotional competence of a brick wall,” Dick grudgingly admitted. At least as far as the people close to him were concerned. It was amazing how kind and compassionate Bruce could be towards the people he saved night for night... and how quickly he seemed to shut off once he got home. It wasn’t that Bruce didn’t love them... Dick was sure Bruce loved him and Jason just as much, if not more, than most fathers did, but he was rubbish at expressing said love in obvious ways. Dick had never minded. He could read his tells. But could Jason?

“Nightwing! Earth to Nightwing!” Her hand was in front of his face, swiping up and down rapidly. Dick blinked and shook his head as if to throw all those thoughts out of his brain.

“Yes, ma’am. Present.” He didn’t even want to know how long she had been trying to get his attention.

“Has he contacted your father yet?”

“If by contacted you mean ‘took over the criminal underworld and then tried to force him to murder a man”, then yes. He has.”

Clancy sighed. “I swear to God, you really make me pull every single word from your brain, don’t you?” The tapping of her pencil now bordered on furious. “What exactly happened? Why didn’t he just go to your father to talk with him? Was this before or after he was ‘supposed to be dead twice over’? Why try to force your father to kill a man?”

Dick grimaced. “Don’t you think I’ve asked myself that before? B—our father... he would have been happy to have him back! Losing Jason... it nearly destroyed him. It sent him down a path of self-destructive, brutal behavior and if it hadn’t been for  Tim—”

“Who’s Tim?”

“My other little brother. Came to us six months after Jason’s death, but that’s not important right no—”

“Your father adopted another boy – and I’m guessing he let him take Jason’s place like Jason once took yours – and you don’t think that’s important?!” Clancy sounded downright insulted. “Do you remember how you felt after he ‘replaced’ you?”

“Yeah, but—” But nothing. Dick snapped his mouth shut. She had a very good point there. He hadn’t taken being replaced as Robin very well either. Then again... “I did not beat up my new little brother, though. Or try to become a crime lord. Or try to force my father to kill.”

“Kill who?”

He didn’t want to say it and Dick could tell that she knew. There was defiance in her eyes, a confrontational attitude that was bound to tear a truly ugly wound into him.

“You know what, this was a bad idea.” He reached for Jason’s note only to watch Clancy’s hand slam down hard onto the paper.

“NO!” If looks could kill, he’d be dead by now. “Don’t get me wrong, Grayson: if you want to back out now and stick your head in the sand, I won’t stop you. You’ve been through hell. And you have every right to take proper care of yourself and do whatever is necessary to keep yourself healthy and sane, but if you are even half the man I know who graduated the Academy of Blüdhaven PD, if you have even the tiniest bit of a desire to be a good brother, then I suggest we finish this. What you put on my table tonight is not just a ‘note’. It’s the very tip of a thorn that’s stuck deep inside you, and if you wanna get it out, it’s bound to hurt a lot. It’s your choice.”

 She was right. It was his choice. “Good night, Clancy.” Dick turned and grappled off into the night.

***

_„Dear Dickie-bird.”_

_Stop._

_“I survived and I’m all back to normal, in case you’re interested.”_

_I’m not._

_“Leaving town to find my own way. Thanks for coming for me, brother.”_

_I didn’t. And I’m not. I never was._

_“I know we don’t agree on much.”_

_We agree on absolutely nothing!_

_“I just wanted to believe we could be a family again.”_

_We never were._

_“And whose fault is that?”_

This time, he was awake in an instant. This time, Dick all but somersaulted out of bed, scurrying backwards like a cornered animal. The loft was dark, empty, and quiet, except for the hum of the fridge and the digits displayed on the microwave.

But in his head, Jason was there. He could still see him when he closed his eyes. The red Robin vest barely hiding the blood, but not the splintered bones. The green gauntlets and mask, covered in ash and soot. The coal black hair, singed and smelling of burnt ... everything. The golden cape, ripped into tatters.

“Stop!”

When he had prayed to be able to stop dreaming of alien vore monster Jason, he had not asked to substitute that image with dead Robin Jason. And yet here he was. Dick swallowed hard, got up and forced down a bowl of cereal bite by miserable-tasting bite, and got back into the suit.

It had been a terrible week since he had talked to Clancy. The note was out of his apartment now, but it still existed and nothing had been resolved. The only change was that he now did not even have the option to burn the damn thing.

On the bright side, the NYPD had stopped trying to murder him. That was nice. Dick counted his blessings as he grappled through the city, foiling muggings and rapes and murders. Okay, they still didn’t like him and he was sure they would throw him in jail if given half a chance, but at least they didn’t try to kill him on sight anymore. That was progress. Baby steps.

He was just about to actually start enjoying patrol again, when the arson call came in. The address was two blocks from his position. Dick banked hard and sprinted across the rooftops.

To Dick’s surprise, it was not a building that was on fire, although the flames still shone high and bright. It the middle of the square, right between the four curved fountains, a pile that looked like something out of a forceful eviction crackled and burned. All around, people were taking pictures.

All of them, except for the woman standing in front of the pile, her hands in her pockets, her face calm and relaxed. Dick dropped down to the sidewalk and approached her slowly.

“Ma’am, I don’t think it’s safe for you to stand so close.”

“It’s my fire.” She sounded as if she were recounting what she had had for breakfast. “I set it. I called it in. I can stand as close as I want.”

“Why—?” God, how many years had he done this job now? And yet, some people still managed to surprise him. “Ma’am, arson it’s a felony, you know that, right? You are going to jail for this.”

“They are my ex-husband’s things,” the woman continued, her eyes still focused on the fire. “This is where we first met. He was a monster. I wasted twenty years of my life on him. He’s in jail now. And the divorce was finally concluded yesterday. I just wanted to make sure I got rid of every last trace he left in my life and I didn’t want to burn down my apartment in the process.”

Dick swallowed hard. “Then you could have done it without committing a felony. You could have thrown his things in the trash and talked to a therapist instead.”

The woman turned and looked at him as if he was from Mars. As if she had never seen another human being before. “Have you never had anything that bothered you so much you just wanted to set it on fire so you’d never have to see it again?”

Dick cringed. He had.

***

This time, when he got to Clancy’s apartment, she was already on her way to bed. Dick contemplated his choices for a minute and was just about to turn and leave when the window opened sharply.

“If you’re thinking about giving me some bull about how I should get my sleep and you don’t want to intrude, I’m going to slap you. Come in.” This time, she didn’t ask if he wanted a drink. The cup she handed him smelled like caffeine and sugar and reminded him vaguely of those energy drinks Tim downed by the pack.  “Please tell me you’re here to finish our conversation from last time.”

“It’s either that or steal back the note and commit arson,” Dick admitted as he sat down on her couch. It felt weird sitting on anyone’s furniture in full costume, but a therapist’s couch? Definitely among the top places he had never wanted to be.

Clancy went back to the same drawer she had gotten pen and paper from before and retrieved the note. Dick raised an eyebrow as she put it on the table.

“You... laminated it?”

“It stank like a dumpster and I couldn’t put it in the washer, could I?” She armed herself with pen, paper and a cup of whatever she had given him. “Alright. Let’s finish it this time, ok?”

“Okay.”

“Who exactly did Jason want your father to kill and why?”

Dick took a deep breath. “Joker.”

“THE Joker?”

“Yes, THE Joker.”

“Okaaay...” Clancy rolled her eyes. “Not a big loss, if you ask me. But why him?”

Dick grimaced. “Because he’s the one who killed Jason.”

The effect was immediate. Clancy choked and sputtered. She sat the cup down quickly, cleared her throat and faced him with a flat “What?”

Dick sighed. “When Jason was fifteen, he disobeyed B’s orders and went after Joker on his own. Jason had always been too rash, too over-confident for his own good. Joker beat him into a pulp and set a bomb... I—I didn’t even hear about it until after the funeral. That was five years ago. A couple of months ago, just before... just before Blüdhaven was destroyed, he showed up back in Gotham, started taking over crime in the city. Then he kidnapped Joker and forced B to make a choice: shoot Joker, shoot Jason, or let Jason shoot Joker.”

Clancy was silent for a long time. Dick watched in quiet trepidation as she tapped her pencil against the table, then drew circles on the pad, then tapped again. Every second made him feel worse.

“I’m sorry. I shouldn’t have bothered you with—”

“How did he choose?” Dick blinked. Clancy didn’t move an inch. “How did he choose, Dick?”

“Well... Joker’s still alive and so is Jason, so I guess he found another way.”

“You guess?!” Clancy spit the words out like they were poison. “Jesus Christ, Dick! This is your brother asking your father whose life he values more – his son’s or his son’s murderer’s – and all you can say is ‘I guess he found another way’?”

“I was dealing with my home city being wiped off the map at the time,” Dick argued. “I didn’t even hear about any of it until much later and by that time we thought that Jason was... well, dead. He did rig the building to explode.”

This time, Clancy didn’t sigh or yell or roll her eyes. His time, she merely braced her elbows on the table and let her face sink into her palms slowly. For a solid two minutes, all was quiet in her apartment, except for the filter of the aquarium on a nearby shelf. When she finally picked up the note, Clancy looked and sounded ten years older.

“‘Dear Dickie-bird’ – he’s calling you a nickname and not a derogatory one. I don’t think he means to hurt you. I’m not sure he ever meant to hurt any of you, especially since, from what you have told me, his violence is usually directed is criminals, rather than innocent bystanders or anyone in the family. If he wanted to kill you, he could have killed you. Same for your father.”

Dick couldn’t argue with that. He was tempted to point out that Jason had attacked him, but then again, he had called him a delusional crack head before that.

“‘I survived and I’m all back to normal, in case you’re interested,’” Clancy continued. If this was someone who had always been emotionally manipulative, someone who had been raised with a sense of entitlement and power, I’d call this typecasting, but given everything you’ve told me about your brother, I’d say it’s more like a cry for help. He doesn’t think you care, but there’s a part of him that keeps on hoping against all odds that you do.”

Dick flinched. He had never even considered that option, the one where Jason thought he didn’t care. After all, he had offered Jason to talk to him if there was trouble... but that had been back before Jason had died. After his return... there had been so much going on. Jason had killed. A lot. He had become a crime lord. He had almost forced Bruce to kill. Blüdhaven had been destroyed. Blockbuster. Tarantula. Jason in Dick’s costume, killing even more... Had there been a single moment when he had taken the chance to tell Jason that he was glad he had returned to life?

Am _I even happy that he’s back?_ Dick shuddered at the thought.

“‘Leaving town to find my own way. Thanks for coming for me, brother.’” Clancy took another sip from her drink and swallowed hard. “I don’t know how you think about him after everything that’s happened, but he clearly still thinks of you as family. He tried to be like you. He failed. He’s moving on. A truly abusive person wouldn’t surrender. A true sociopath wouldn’t care. And neither would thank you, that’s for sure.”

“It wasn’t even my idea”, Dick said quietly, and the words tasted like acid in his mouth. “Coming for him... to help him... you remember the conversation we had right?” Clancy nodded glumly. “I needed two pushes out the door to actually go and help him and I still left him behind when things went to hell.” Dick felt a dark laugh bubble up inside his gut and drowned it with a sip from the disgustingly sugar-heavy energy drink. “It was another explosion, if you can believe it. I never even considered that it might remind him of...”

“‘I know we don’t agree on much.’”

“ _That_ is still the understatement of the year,” Dick argued and Clancy smiled.

“I agree. I also think he’s fully aware of that, but he _is_ acknowledging it and agreeing to disagree is one way to show that you respect the other person in the conversation, if nothing else.”

He wanted to say that that wasn’t good enough, not when it came to killing, but then again, he had killed Joker before and felt good about it, so who was he to talk?

“‘I just wanted to believe we could be a family again.’”

“We never were.”

“Well, not in the ways that count, anyway,” Clancy agreed, “but that’s not the part of that sentence that matters. What matters is ‘I just wanted to believe we could be”. Remember when I told you that trying to be you was basically adolescent hero worship?”

“Yeah,” he did remember that conversation very clearly. It was the same one in which Clancy had asked him if he was not taking Jason down because he was secretly entertaining the idea of letting him take over so that Dick himself could have a normal life. The worst part about it was that the thought had crossed his mind. “But Jason’s not a kid. He’s twenty and—“

“Emotionally, he’s not,” Clancy cut in quickly. “He died when he was fifteen and even if he magically came back to life just a month later, the event itself would still have had devastating effects on his development. We see it all the time with children who go through severely traumatic events. Why do you think children who grow up in abusive homes tend to defend their plushies as if their lives depended on them even thirty years later? Why do you think a lot of people who get buried alive sleep with the lights on for months and years afterwards, unless they receive therapy? Heaven knows what _dying_ and coming back would do to a person...”

“No clinical precedent for that one, huh?” It wasn’t supposed to be a joke and thankfully it didn’t come out as one. Clancy shook her head.

“In the end, what matters is that you were all he had left. Look at the choices he gave to your father: protect him from the monster who killed him, kill him, or let him protect himself.”

“Killing is not protection.”

“Oh? So you think he does this for fun?”

Dick bit his lip. He didn’t. Somehow that made it worse.

“The worst part is that your father didn’t even go looking for him after that. Or at least if he did, he apparently didn’t put too much effort into it. Jason’s practically begging you to prove that you are better than him, that at least _you_ care more about him. I mean, you were the one who offered him to come talk to you if he ever got in trouble with dad, right?”

Dick froze. It was more than the simple, instinctive clenching of muscles. He could feel the chill on his skin, the dread in his gut as the realization sank in. The words he had said to Jason all those years ago echoed in his mind once more, now hollow and haunting.

_There’s going to be times when you’re going to want to talk to someone. I’ve been where you’re at and I’m a good listener._

“Oh God...”

He felt sick. His stomach lurched and apparently something must have given him away, because the next thing he knew, Clancy was there, shoving a salad bowl under his face. His stomach accepted the invitation immediately and spilled the half cup of caffeine drink he had consumed into it together with acid that made his throat burn.

What had he done? Okay, Jason had killed. He had made a lot of horrible choices and he had behaved in truly horrible ways, but when things had gone south with Bruce, he had done exactly what Dick had once encouraged him to do: he had come to him.

 _And I did nothing_. The thought chilled him to the core. He hadn’t spent much time with Jason, back before he had died, but they _had been_ brothers and Dick _had_ cared about him. Hearing of his death had devastated Dick. He still remembered the ugly fight he had had with Bruce over it. He remembered the sadness that overwhelmed him every 27 th of April and every 16th of August and he remembered the fear that gripped him every time Tim was in danger, another younger brother. Another Robin. He remembered how _good_ it had felt to beat Joker to a pulp when he gloated about him.

And now that he thought about it, now that his mind returned to the conversation with Alfred, because Bruce had sure as hell not been willing to talk about it, he remembered the spark of joy in his gut at the revelation that Jason had come back to life, even if he had evidently come back wrong.

“It’s too late now, isn’t it?” Dick swallowed back the tears, but the bitterness clung to his voice. “It’s been three weeks since he sent me this. It’s too late now, right? He’s probably halfway around the planet right now and completely convinced that I don’t ever want to have anything to do with him again, right?”

“Well,” Clancy took the bowl from him and flushed the contents down the toilet, then rinsed it and returned it to him. “I always like to say it’s never too late until you die and with your brother even that is evidently not enough.”

Dick laughed and even though it was a dark, pained sound, it made him feel just a little lighter.

“What matters, is what _you_ want to do now,” Clancy continued. “Let me make this perfectly clear, Dick: nobody owes anyone any kind of relationship, ever. If you don’t want to be a brother to him, then you don’t have to, but if you do, I suggest you find him, as soon as possible, and start talking to him. Jason is right: you probably won’t agree on much. But so far, everyone he’s come back to has abandoned him and that, especially against the background of his early childhood trauma, has got to be a devastating pattern for him. If you do care even a little about him, I encourage you to reach out.”

“I don’t know where to start.” Dick admitted. “I mean, he really could be halfway around the world. And what am I going to say to him if I find him? ‘Hi there, sorry it took me so long, how’s it going’?”

Clancy shrugged. “That doesn’t actually sound too bad. And if you’re even the slightest bit happy that he’s not... you know... dead anymore, I’d tell him that too. Sounds like your father dropped the ball on that one.”

He probably did. No. He almost certainly did. Dick grimaced. He’d eat his own cowl if Bruce had actually managed to get any variation of ‘I’m happy you’re alive’ out from between his teeth.

“Thank you, Clancy.” Dick pushed the bowl away slowly. He was about ninety-five percent sure he wasn’t going to need it again. “I think I’d better get going.”

“Take a day or two off.” Clancy said quickly as she followed him on his way back to the window. “Seriously, Nightwing, that’s a lot of emotional labor you just went through. Let it sink in, take some time to process it, then act. It will be healthier for both of you.”

She had no idea how right she was. Dick didn’t like to admit it, but he was capable of emotional rollercoasting on a whole new level. Come to think of it, Jason wasn’t the only one in the family with a temper. Seeking him out while still wound up like this was not going to end well.

“You are a blessing, Clancy.” He hugged her just long enough to feel her pat his shoulders back tentatively, then slipped out the window onto the branches of the oak in front of her house. Clancy turned around and came back a moment later, handing him the laminated note with a short yawn. Another reminder of just how much he had put this poor woman through over the last two weeks. “I promise this will be the last time you have to work pro bono for me.”

Clancy smiled. “It had better be.”

Dick returned the gesture and grappled off into the night, a slight smile on his face.  No arson for him tonight.

***

He wired the money straight into Clancy’s account, double pay for dealing with a client with two identities. Then, Dick wrote the check for Mr. Charles, left it on the dresser by the bed, and packed his meager possessions into the same duffle bag he had used for bringing them to New York. It felt strange leaving the city again so soon, but who was he fooling? Part of him would always feel at home in Gotham and New York was not the same without the Titans, without his friends.

The ride back home was uneventfully quiet, his arrival even more so. He knew the codes to the manor’s security systems like the back of his hand. The gate slid open with a slow rattle. Dick didn’t bother to park his bike in the garage. He was not going to stay long. The front driveway would do.

He was not surprised when the door opened before he had even fully turned the key.

“Master Dick, what a pleasant surprise.”

Alfred’s voice sounded flat, but courteous, as always. His face was ninety-eight percent professional neutrality and two percent fatigue, but even so, Dick could see and hear the small quirks that gave away his joy at the unexpected visit. Dick was not surprised when the hug he gave just a second after coming in was met with equal warmth and gratitude.

“It’s good to see you too, Alfred. Is Bruce up and about?”

Alfred snorted. “Believe it or not, he is actually asleep for once. Shall I wake him?”

“Oh no, it’s alright.” Dick focused on the cheer – not entirely fake – to swallow the sigh of relief he wanted to give at those words. He had hoped getting to the manor at half past three in the afternoon would get him out of the pickle of involving Bruce in this. “I would love a chat with you though, Alfred.”

He said it and he meant it. Dick consoled himself with that, even as Alfred led him to the den and went to get some tea. He had also offered to throw Dick’s supposedly not so fresh laundry into the machine for a quick spin, but Dick had neither been willing to risk staying that long, nor willing to admit that Alfred’s assessment of his level of personal upkeep was painfully accurate. What really gnawed at him was the nagging feeling that he was not _just_ here to chat with Alfred. Part of him felt like he was taking horrible advantage of the man who had almost been like a second mother to him.

And like any mother, nothing escaped Alfred for long.

“Master Dick, not to presume...” Alfred said over a long sip of Earl Grey a little more than five minutes into the conversation, “but I would not be surprised if you are here for more than just pleasant talk about the weather and roses and the benefit of living in a city that is not drowning in rain and crime on a daily basis. What is it that brought you back here without a call ahead?”

Dick finished his tea and set the cup down carefully. Dear God, was he happy that Bruce was not joining this conversation.

“I was wondering if you had heard any news from Jason.”

Dick might as well have asked if Alfred had recently seen a zombie or a ghost. Alfred’s hands froze, just for a fraction of a second. His face twitched. His eyes, previously warm with genuine appreciation and a spark of curiosity, suddenly turned sad and clouded.

“I have had no news from him since that night with Master Bruce and the Joker. To be frank...” Alfred sounded... old. Older than he had ever sounded before and Dick barely managed to suppress the flinch. “... I am not sure he is still alive. Master Bruce said he was badly injured when the building collapsed. We could not find him in all the... madness afterwards and no-one has heard from the Red Hood in the year since. He even kept the glass case standing, saying it made no difference.” Then, like a candle in a storm, just a little bit of hope flickered in his voice. “Do you have any indication that he might still be alive?”

That actually made Dick laugh, at least until he remembered that Bruce had the ears of a fox. “More than an indication Alfred. I... met him, in New York.” That was quite possibly the most diplomatic lie he had ever uttered. Judging from the quirking of Alfred’s brow, it was also the most obvious one. “He did horrible things, Alfred, but... looking back on it... I was pretty awful to him, too. I want to set things right. I want to find him and see if there’s even a tiny piece of the Jason we once knew left in him. If there is... even just a little... than it’s worth fighting for.”

Alfred nodded slowly. “How may I help you?”

***

For once, things had gone at least moderately as planned. Dick sighed in relief as he entered one of his old Gotham safe-houses and put his clothes in the laundry. Alfred had agreed to keep his investigation and even his return to Gotham from Bruce for the time being and help him cover his electronic traces. He would have loved to do this without the Batcomputer, but there was only one person Dick could think of who had the resources for that... and he couldn’t ask her. Not yet. Not after everything.

One messed up relationship at the time.

He started with the obvious places, searching GCPD’s files as well as any criminal on-goings Bruce had on his map for traces of Red Hood. There were none. Dick wondered what this must have looked like to GCPD – a new crime lord appears out of nothing, takes over all of Gotham, lures Batman and Joker into a trap and then just... disappears. Poof. Like magic.

But Dick knew Jason didn’t have magic. He didn’t need it either. He was just that good.

By the end of the week, Dick had a headache to match his guilt and the few hours of sleep he caught here and there did not make it better. They were filled with images of Jason, trying to drag himself out of his grave, only for Batman, Nightwing, and Robin—Tim—to push him back down and shovel dirt on him. It was always raining, but he couldn’t hear the thunder. Just Jason, reading out the note, word by agonizing word.

August ended and turned to September, bringing with it the late summer storms that were so typical of Gotham and the horrifying realization that he had not only missed the chance to help Jason, back in New York, but his birthday as well. It seemed trivial, compared to how much of a mess the rest of this affair was and yet it also seemed important.

Dick did the best he could to push the thought out of his mind and concentrated on the mission once more.

Alfred was happy to provide him with a list of aliases Jason had used before, both before and after his return, and Dick threw himself into the research with renewed enthusiasm. At some point around the ten-day-mark, he moved his blanket from the bedroom to the couch in the living room. The coffee table had become the center of his universe, his own micro-cosmos, and somewhere underneath the notes and the empty boxes of cereal, Dick was sure a healthy culture of bacteria had set up shop. For now, it didn’t matter. He could clean up once he had a trail.

He was halfway through September when the last of his searches came up empty. Dick sighed as he reached for the carton of milk to his left on sheer automatic and took a deep gulp.

He spit it out almost as quickly, then dived for the kitchen sink where he retched up whatever was left in his stomach. Dick looked at the carton and grimaced. Underneath the picture of a missing high school principal, the August expiry date all but laughed at him.

“Right. No more food from the back of the fridge.” He was just about to throw it into the trash, when his brain screeched to a halt.

There had been a “missing” picture for Jason, back in New York. With his real name.

“No, you wouldn’t...”

But he would. Dick knew it, even as he dumped the carton of spoilt dairy and returned to his laptop. Jason _would_ have the audacity, the sheer _balls_ , to move right back into Gotham under his own name.

There were no criminal records under his name and that drew a good, long sigh from Dick. He had a hard enough time ignoring his feelings about Jason’s... attitude towards lethal force, for the sake of this mad quest he had embarked on. Having a paper trail of it would have been torture. Dick gave Alfred a quick heads-up, then started a thorough search for any recorded matches to Jason’s Name, DNA and finger prints, before curling up underneath the sheets. The search would run for five hours at least, anyway, crawling through every single database that was, in any way, shape, or form, connected to the internet in Gotham.

And if this did not work out... Dick shuddered at the thought. If this didn’t work, he’d have to comb through Gotham piece by piece, searching for the proverbial low profile needle in the anonymity-through-hard-cash shadows of Gotham. It was a game he’d played before. An exhausting, demoralizing game that made Monopoly look like kittens and sunshine and he was not looking forward to it.

The first ping came two hours and fourteen seconds into his search and originated from GCPD. Dick felt his stomach freeze over as he opened the search results.

_Goddamn it, Jason, what did you—_

“Missing person?” Dick’s eyebrows climbed a quarter inch at the words. He clicked the file with just the tiniest bit of hesitation, which quickly morphed into horror.

It was a finger print match for a John Doe, a boy, fifteen or sixteen years old, who had been found shambling along a dark road just before Halloween like some real-life zombie, dressed in a tattered suit covered in dirt. The list of injuries the hospital had catalogued was a familiar litany of anguish that Dick had read once before. Cracked skull, shattered sternum, forty other fractures, a collapsed lung, and flash burns all over. At the bottom of the list, Dick read the words ‘lacerations and split nails on all digits’, followed by the mention of the sheer amount of dirt and splintered wood they had dug out from underneath his cracked nails and Dick was ready to throw up again.

Jason had dug his way out of his own grave. _Dear mother of God..._

In a rare show of competence and diligence, GCPD had done its job well. They had searched every missing persons database in the country for the boy’s fingerprints and DNA, but of course Bruce had made sure those were wiped from existence the moment he had decided to make Jason Robin. However, it was the last note in the file that made Dick’s heart clench.

They had searched for missing boys whose fathers were called Bruce, because those had been the only two words Jason had said before falling into a coma. Bruce. Dad.

In his first moments of painful waking, Jason had clung to Bruce, or at least the memory of him like a lifeline, and no matter what happened in the time between—there was some mention in the file of John ‘Bruceson’ Doe having been transferred to a hospice for long-term comatose patients—when he had returned to full consciousness, he had sought out Bruce first. He had clung to him for protection from the monster who had killed him, and somehow that night had ended with Bruce protecting the Joker instead and Jason winding up in New York a year later.

Clancy was right. Something was seriously wrong here. He was missing a crucial part of the puzzle and the longer he thought about it, the more Dick realized that there were only three people in the world who’d be able to give him an answer: Bruce, Jason, or Joker.

It was like choosing between a frying pan, a fire, and a river of lava. Arsenic, cyanide, strychnine. Pick your poison.

“Oh, fuck my life!”

Dick pushed the laptop away and poured himself another cup of coffee instead. Only when the liquid had nearly reached the rim did he realize that he had poured it into his cereal bowl, rather than the mug.

“Fruit loop flavored coffee...” Dick sighed. “Yeah, that’s what you deserve you big idiot.” It tasted a bad as it sounded, he really didn’t mind. He deserved the punishment. And it kept him awake.

He was not going to get a straight answer from Joker, that much was for sure. Aside from being a notorious liar and a complete lunatic, Joker was a master opportunist. The only thing involving him would do, would be to give him more ammo to taunt Bruce or, God forbid, Jason with later. Bruce was going to stone-wall him for sure, at least until his patience ran thin. Then they would get into another one of their epic shouting matches that left everyone raw and hurting, only to be brushed under the rug later.

That left Jason as the only option and Dick was already reeling just thinking about it. There was enough bad blood between them. This could only end in disaster.

 _But I have to try._ Dick closed his eyes and counted to ten. _I owe it Jason. As a brother. As a former Robin. As his role model._

He had obviously done a lousy job of at least one of those things, but he couldn’t let that stop him. Someone in this family had to be an optimist and if Bruce had taught him one good lesson, it was never to give up hope.

He hoped Jason would listen. He hoped Jason would stay.

***

The second ping came an hour and a half later, just as he returned from the shower. This time, it was for Jason’s name. Dick braced himself for another horror story with a deep chug of coffee and nearly ended up choking.

It was a ping from Gotham U. In the picture that went with registration number 357-303891, a young man was looking stubbornly at the camera, no smile, no twitch, not a single hair messing up the symmetry of the biometric picture, except for a white tuft of hair over his right eye. He had enrolled the year before and was now starting his third semester in... Dick was pretty sure that was a faculty code at the beginning of the number. A quick search proved him right.

“Double major in Biochemistry and Forensic Sciences...” For some reason, the choice set off little alarm bells in Dick’s head. Bruce had already taught each of them pretty much everything they could ever learn about forensics and even though Dick hadn’t been around much when Jason had been a kid, he had heard enough from Alfred to know that Jason had been very interested in literature and sociology. “Why the sudden change?”

Whatever it was that had spurned Jason to pursue an education in biochemistry, Dick had to admit he had thrown himself at it with a ferocity that was admirable. Somewhere between recovering from the collapse of his criminal empire and his feud with Black Mask and whatever had happened between him, Bruce, and Joker, Jason had managed to score straight As in all his exams and be at class on the dot, every single day for a full year. The annual evaluations his professors had to write for each student praised his intelligence, competence, and rigorous work ethic. The more brazen ones also mentioned his antisocial attitudes. Judging from the entry-and-exit records Dick managed to dig out of Gotham U’s keycard system, he had spent half his time off in the campus main library.

Dick pictured the scene just for a second and felt his breath turn into near hysterical laughter.

Here he was, expecting to find a violent gang leader and drug lord, who eliminated his competition permanently. Instead, he had found a second year student who attended his classes with a religiousness that rivaled the most pious worshippers Dick had ever encountered.

 _And I’m going to muck it all up_ , Dick thought glumly as he dug deeper into Jason Todd’s records to unearth his schedule and address. What if Jason was happier like this, just living like a normal twenty-year-old, far outside of the nocturnal realm of Batman and Joker and all those that followed in their wake? What if going to see him, to talk to him, to try to make amends, was only going to spoil this good thing that he had found, this thing in which he was successful and free of nightmares?

There was only one way to find out. Dick could not imagine it ending in anything but disaster.

“I’m sorry, Jason.”

***

It was Wednesday, September 19th, when Dick perched outside of Gotham U’s faculty of chemistry, hidden in the branches of a particularly tall ash in the blind spot of the main entrance. The minute the clock struck nine, the doors opened wide, spilling out a shuffling crowd of students who bemoaned the late Molecular and Cell Biology I lecture. Apparently, the professor was an ass. Apparently the reading list was insane. Apparently the library was constantly short on the required books and the waiting lists were longer than the Holy Bible. Apparently, life as a third year Biochemistry Major royally sucked every Wednesday.

Dick was not surprised. He _had c_ hosen this day for a reason. Fatigue could do wonders in making usually combative people at least somewhat manageable.

The flood of students turned into a trickle quickly enough, before stopping for good only six minutes after the end of class. Dick shifted uncomfortably as the minutes ticked by. Had Jason not come to class today? That would be a first. Had he hacked Gotham U’s systems to monitor his own file and be alerted of any suspicious activities? Dick couldn’t put it past him. Over-preparedness was a page one of the manual lesson in Bruce’s school in vigilantism.

Ten minutes after nine, on the dot, the doors swung open once more. Dick held his breath and forced his body to become still as a dead possum.

He looked so much... younger. It was unmistakably Jason, even though that white streak in his hair was new and the defiant scowl on his face would have looked better on Bruce. The way he walked—a light tread with a determination that bordered on a military march—was more than conclusive. And yet...

 _Perhaps it was the hoodie_ , Dick mused as he followed Jason’s quick strides and plotted his route along the surrounding trees and buildings. It was a deep, rich crimson, against which the ivory of the Gotham U logo and creed—Scientia Noctem Numquam Timet—stood out pale as bones. Somehow it managed to shroud the two-hundred pounds of muscle that Dick knew from painful experience lay underneath it and made him look so much younger and smaller. It reminded him of when Jason had been Robin, too short and too light-weight for a boy his age. He had not called him Little Wing just for kicks.

And dear God, did that nickname bring back memories... Dick swallowed a he grappled along the streets that led to Robinson Park, the green sea that separated Gotham U from Jason’s apartment. It was unusual for students not to live on campus, but Dick didn’t have to think hard to come up with at least half a dozen reasons why living in a dorm was probably the last thing Jason would want.

“Are you actually gonna come down here and talk or are you just gonna stalk me for the rest of the night?”

Dick blinked as he headed deeper into the greenery. For a moment, he was almost sure he had imagined that. After all, Jason had just kept on walking. Then, just as abruptly as the tree line had swallowed them, a tennis-ball-sized stone flew right past his ear with enough speed to cause that distinct wheezing of objects in fast flight. Suddenly, Jason was standing, not budging an inch, not showing a single trickle of emotion as he planted himself like a tree and glowered at Dick’s hiding spot in the trees.

“I thought you had better things to do with your time. What? New York not exciting enough anymore? Or did Cheyenne drop you like a sack of hot coals?”

Dick bit his lip. It was just like Jason to go straight for the low blows. What really bothered him though, was that there was no forcefulness, no temper, behind it. He had said it with the same voice normal people would use to greet their co-workers in the morning and that was scarier than the entire park and everything in it.

Jason was pissed. Great. Good start.

“I wanted to talk.” Dick finally managed when his brain had finished rushing through all his usual solutions for dealing with dangerous criminals. It had very stubbornly refused to acknowledge that this was Jason, not Red Hood. “I got your message—“

“Fuck off!”

 _There_ was that temper. Dick felt a strange sense of relief wash over him, like a black cloud lifted. Angry Jason was familiar. Angry Jason he could deal with. “I know that—“

“You don’t.” Jason still hadn’t moved an inch, but Dick could see the change – the setting of his jaw, the slight narrowing of his eyes, the tiny spark of tension in his posture. “You don’t know a damn thing about anything and I’m not interested in being your therapy project. Get fucked and stay out of my way. I want absolutely nothing to do with you, _dick_.”

“Oh how original...” Dick rolled his eyes. “Please, Ja—“ This time it was not a stone that flew past his ear. This time it was a batarang. Dick froze as he felt the sharp prick of cold night air against the paper cut it had left in his cheek.

“Stay. Away. From. Me.”

Jason turned around and continued walking.

***

He dreamed of the grave again. It was raining and there was a pumpkin. _That makes sense_ , Dick thought to himself as he dug faster. It had been just before Halloween when Jason had been resurrected. Bruce and Tim were gone. That made sense, too. They hadn’t been there when Jason had woken up in his grave.

_Neither had you, dick._

This time, Jason wasn’t the one breaking the coffin. This time, he didn’t hurl words at him. This time, Dick ripped off the cover, only to be greeted by a storm of batarangs, sailing past him at lightning speed. One cut his cheek, another hit his throat. Strangely enough, the second one felt more real than the first.

 _That makes no sense at all_ , Dick mused to himself, as Jason pulled a sheer infinite supply of blades from the pouch of his hoodie. _He hit me in the cheek, not the throat._

Then, one struck him in the eyes. Dick woke with a scream.

The sun was high up in the sky, proving that he hadn’t gotten nearly as much sleep as he had wanted to. His only consolation was that everyone else in the family had probably gotten even less. Bruce was probably in some fancy meeting, Jason had classes all day on Thursday, and Tim practically ran on coffee, rather than blood. It was a meager comfort, but he was going to take what he could get. Dick reached for the cereal and milk on autopilot and started forcing as much as he could down his throat while he browsed Jason’s Gotham U file.

Either he had overlooked something important or Clancy had been wrong. _Or_ , Dick thought with a shudder, _Jason’s mental state is worse than I had anticipated_.

There were several neurological or psychiatric conditions that could explain Jason’s sudden shift from murderous, but trying to force himself into Dick’s life by any means necessary, to mellow and well-adjusted, but determined to the point of murder to keep Dick away from him by any means necessary. That batarang had been a threat, a warning.

He was almost finished with his breakfast when he noticed what he had missed the day before.

There was one more asymmetry in Jason’s strangely unblemished picture for Gotham U. Sure, Photoshop was a thing, but Jason had suffered severe flash burns, cuts and bruises. They should have left scars, yet Jason’s face had been free of any marring lines, even before their disastrous encounter with that alien parasite in New York. Yet in this picture, with the light adjusted to banish every shadow, with no costume to hide as much of him as possible, Dick could see a scar that hadn’t there before, back when Jason had been Robin, back when he had died.

It was a cut, a long, white line that stretched all along the left side of Jason’s neck, just above the trapezius muscle. Dick felt his own muscle tingle in sympathy pain. An injury that left that kind of scar must have been deep and—given the proximity to many important arteries—potentially lethal. Judging from how thin the cut seemed, it must have been a very thin, very sharp blade. Like a bata—

“No.” Dick shook his head. “No. No. NO. NO!” Bruce would not do that. Not to Jason. Not to Red Hood. Not even to Joker. He wouldn’t do that to anyone. Dick was sure of it.

And yet, for the rest of the day, the thought weighed on his mind like a tumor pushing on a cancer-infected organ.

***

It was late morning the next day when his curiosity finally got the better of Dick. He had tried sleep. He had tried exercise. He had tried entertainment. He had tried work. Nothing had been able to take his mind of the outrageous theory his mind had dreamt up. He had to know.

There were several widely-believed fallacies when it came to home safety. The first and most important one was that most burglaries happened at night. They didn’t. Nine to twelve in the morning was the sweet spot when everyone was either at work or school. The second fallacy was that any burglar would try to enter through a window or the fire escape. With a little bit of subterfuge, it was a lot easier getting in through the front door.

Dick chose the disguise of a plumber. It wasn’t hard to do. No-one ever checked the credentials of a plumber. If the overall was blue and the guy was carrying a heavy toolbox, no-one cared much. As a bonus point, it allowed him to keep his lock picks, signal jammers, and escrima sticks in a handy place.

The accent he put on was distinctly Bowery, but not too thick. He only had to try two bells before someone let him in to “fix the broken meter in the boiler room”. He doubted the old lady who let him in even knew if there was a boiler, much less with a broken meter. All she heard was “fix”, “broken meter”, and the implicit “holy mother of God – my heating bill!”

Jason’s apartment was on the sixth floor, at the far end of the south wing corridor. The only camera Dick had spotted on his way was broken. The carpet was scuffed. The walls had water damage here and there. The apartment door right next to Jason’s had been kicked in, the place ransacked and tossed. Dick could spot a patch of dried blood on the carpet in the living room.

He prayed to God that Jason hadn’t been involved in any of it.

Jason, whose door had a peephole, three locks and a silent, magnetic entry detection system with a deactivation panel that was hidden in the cupboard on the inside, next to the door. Dick had fifteen seconds to find and disarm the damn thing and sighed in relief when he made it in fourteen.

Jason, who had another infrared system set up at every door to the adjacent rooms.

Jason, whose windows had triple locks.

Jason, whose apartment looked so spotless and tidy, as if it had just been cleaned this very morning, whose kitchen was positively shining and smelled of... pomegranate?

Dick raised an eyebrow. Now that he took a closer look, almost everything in the tiny apartment was pomegranate red, from the cupboards to the chairs to the couch to the paint on the walls. The book shelves that hung all around and above the windows were painted red. There was a six-by-six-foot-painting of _The Blood Of A Pomegranate_  by Stephen Mackey on the wall that separated the living room from the bed room. The symbolism was as obvious as it was disturbing. The only thing that kept a smile on Dick’s face as he slowly inched forward, trying to identify any other potential alarms, was the table cloth spread across the coffee table in front of the couch: the chemical elements. It was a periodic table.

The smile died when he got to the bedroom.

It was like stepping into another world. Gone was the tidiness and the cleanliness. The bedroom was a mess and that was saying a lot considering Dick’s standards. The sheets were everywhere but the bed. The broken shutters were creaking softly. The lamp on the bedside table was broken, too. The one on the ceiling was missing its shade. The closet and drawers were wide open, clothes spilling out in a mad tangle. There were scratches on the inside of the doors.

 _On the inside of the coffin_ , Dick realized with a sharp stab of dread. How often had Jason woken up in the night, jolted out of a nightmare, to see a wall of dark wood and ripped it open, torn through the lining, until he noticed that they were doors, not lids, clothes, not cushions?

The tiny bathroom attached to the bed room was no better. It was spotless alright, but it also smelled of bleach. In the cabinet below the sink, Dick found exactly one spare tube of tooth paste, but six different bottles of painkillers, half of which required either a prescription or a pharmacy robbery, sixteen packs of gauze, four rolls of bandages and enough disinfectant to kill any germ within a ten feet radius. In the back of the cupboard, behind a fake pane, Dick found another four bottles of Thorazine.

Perhaps his guess of Jason being psychotic wasn’t as far off as he had hoped.

Dick, put the bottles back in place, closed the cabinet and backed out of the bathroom and bed room slowly. He shouldn’t have come here. He shouldn’t—

“Find something interesting?”

Dick _almost_ jumped. It took him every ounce of control he had learned in his life to suppress the natural reaction of flight. The list of people who could sneak up to him was short. Unfortunately, Jason was among them. He took a deep breath and turned around slowly.

Jason was standing just inside a door, with his backpack in one hand and a gun in the other, as if the two were one and the same. Dick doubted he had brought it with him to the Campus, but that only meant he must have hidden it somewhere close by the door and retrieved it so quietly, Dick had not heard a sound. The alarm bells were wringing in his ear. Dick swallowed hard.

“Hey Jason. I thought you had Anatomy III on Friday mornings.”

“I thought I’d told you to stay away from me,” Jason all but growled at him. He flicked the safety off the gun with one swift move. “You have thirty seconds to tell me what you’re doing here and get out, before I put a bullet through your head, call the cops, and tell them you tried to rob me.”

 _No pressure at all_ , Dick thought as he analyzed his options quickly. He was fast, but not fast enough to dodge a hail of bullets from someone as competent as Jason. He could maybe, maybe, take him in one-on-one combat, but he had not come here to break his brother’s bones. He had not come here to hurt anyone. He thought back to the conversation he had had about Red Hood with Bruce, about how Jason had become a murderer and died attempting to murder someone. He thought about how they had met in New York, how Jason had tried to strike up camaraderie over slitting rapists’ throats. He thought about the fight they had had at the agency, about Jason’s face on the milk carton, and Cheyenne’s insistence that they do something. He thought about the... the thing... Jason had become that night. About how he had left Jason to die in another explosion.

 _Jason’ll have to take care of Jason this time_ , Dick had told Cheyenne as he had run from the blast, abandoning his little brother to his fate.

“Twenty-five.”

He thought about Clancy’s anger. He thought about the note. He thought about the feeling of repulsion as he had realized what it had all meant.

“I want to apologize,” Dick started, and suddenly it all came back. It was as if his tongue was on fire, running from his vocal chords as fast as could be. His synapses were firing from all cylinders and it made sense. If these were his last twenty-five seconds on God’s green Earth, he might as well make them count.

“I’m sorry, truly sorry, for how I treated you in New York. I’m sorry I was never much of a brother to you, even before Joker. I’m sorry I called you names in New York. I’m sorry I left you to die in that explosion. I’m sorry I ignored your telegram. I’m sorry I’m intruding on what seems to be a pretty neat life right now. You have every right to be angry. You have every right not to want me here. I’ve been one hell of a disappointment of a big brother to you and I’m sorry my grand plan for fixing it was hacking your Gotham U file and tracking you here. I’m sorry I broke into your apartment. I’m sorry. And I know you have no reason to believe that I’m serious about what I’m going to say next, but I’m glad you’re still alive. I may not approve of Red Hood, but I approve of you, Jason. And I’ll thank the Lord for however many seconds I have left that he gave you another chance.”

“Another chance?” Jason raised the gun slowly. His finger was on the trigger, his aim was dead on. For a few precious seconds—twelve, if the clock on the wall was right, although to Dick it felt more like five thousand—Jason didn’t move, didn’t breathe, didn’t blink.

Then, he released the magazine, retrieved the bullet from the chamber, and dropped the gun on element 33, AS for Arsenic.

“I’ll give you credit for being the first one,” Jason mumbled, almost too low to hear, as he circled around the armchair and the waist-high wall to the kitchen and started unpacking groceries from his backpack. Dick would not have been surprised if there was another gun in one of the counters behind that wall. He was almost certain Jason was just waiting for him to fuck up.

“The first of what?” Dick asked, trying to keep his voice as calm and gentle as possible, the same tone he had used all those years ago, when he had promised Jason to be there, to listen, if he needed help.

Jason flinched. “To say you’re happy I’m back.”

“What?” That made no sense. What the—“You’re gonna tell me Bruce wasn’t even the slightest bit relieved and happy—“ Suddenly, there was a six inch knife in Jason’s hand. Dick froze as it was raised and pointed in his direction.

“Don’t you dare!” His voice sounded sour enough to curdle dairy. Somewhere underneath the anger, Dick could hear bitterness and pain. Not the superficial, wounded pride kind of pain, but deep, personal hurt. “I swear to fucking heaven and hell, if you use his name in my apartment again, I’ll carve you up into so many pieces, the rats in that alley down there will be eating like kings for the next two months! Don’t think I won’t be able to fit you into my freezer.”

 _Well, this has escalated quickly_. Dick wanted to curse the part of his brain that decided to be a jester about this. The more precise a threat, the more likely it was to actually be made real. And Jason had been very, very precise.

“Okay.” He took another step forward, just one foot in front of the other, like a waddling duck. He didn’t doubt for a second that Jason had noticed. “Okay. He hurt you. You don’t want to talk about it. That’s okay.” It really wasn’t, but he was currently walking through a mine field. He did not have the luxury of being picky. “I’m just trying to understand what’s happened to you, Jason.”

His little brother scoffed while decapitating a fresh cod. “Joker killed me. I came back to life. I cross the lines all you delicate snow flakes don’t dare to cross. There you go, easy.”

“Yeah, that’s what I thought, too, at first,” Dick admitted. “But I doubt it’s as easy as that. I saw the file.”

“You’re gonna have to be way more specific than that.”

“The one from Gotham General. About a fifteen-year-old kid who stumbled in front of a car, after having been beaten, set on fire, and buried. Who kept on saying only two words. A kid whose finger prints could not be found in any missing persons database, because he was missed, but not missing.”

“No-one missed me,” Jason cut in sharply as he started gutting the fish. The smell was atrocious. Jason didn’t seem to care.

“Of course we—“

“No, you fucking didn’t!” The knife flew past Dick’s head with a sharp swish and collided with Persephone with a loud thud. Before Dick could even say ‘what the hell’, Jason had procured another one and continued butchering the fish. “Didn’t even take Bruce six months to get himself a new, shiny Robin. You sure as fuck didn’t seem too bothered. I pulled the records from the funeral home. Just the asshole, the priest, Alfie, Babs and her dad. Not too mention, you buried me next to that selfish—“

Suddenly, it was as if he had touched hot coals. Jason ditched the knife in the sink unceremoniously and bagged the fish quickly. He tossed it into the freezer— _definitely big enough to hold a chopped up man_ , Dick thought grimly—and went for the chicken breast and a fresh knife. Dick didn’t even want to know how many he had left.

“Titans didn’t fucking care, either,” Jason finally continued. “Every single one of them that ever died on the job got a fancy statue. What did I get? Nothing. Hell, even the fucking media couldn’t be bothered. I was dead and forgotten after a month, and you know it.”

Dick swallowed hard. Maybe now was the time that it would come in handy that his babysitters had been knife-throwers. “I can’t speak for anyone else, Jason, but I never forgot you. I was off-world. I didn’t even know that you were dead until after the funeral. I should have been there. I should have helped you when Bruce didn’t. I should have protected you from Joker—“

“Is that what this is about?!” Jason glared at him from behind the counter and the only thing that spoke murder clearer than the look in his eyes was the way his fingers dug into the chicken. “Is that what you came here for? To tell me how very, very hard my death was for you? How much it pained you? And oh, if you could only have been there to save me! Nightwing can save anyone! Dick Grayson is the best! Oh my, I failed, whatever shall I do?!! Please tell me you forgive me so my ego can be healed! IS THAT WHY YOU ARE FUCKING HERE???!!”

Another knife flew. This time Dick dodged, and good thing too. He heard something crash behind him as it sailed past where his head had been and hit... something... in the bed room. Possible the broken lamp.

“Well, you gotta find your sympathy somewhere else, goldilocks!” Jason spat at him as he packaged and stored the chicken. “I have none. Tell me one thing, just ONE! One thing you DID to actually mourn me! ME, not the fact that you couldn’t be the perfect son, who picks up all the balls the old bastard drops!”

Dick’s snapped his jaw shut the moment it moved. His first instinct had been to say ‘I realized I had been a horribly neglectful brother, so I tried to do better by Tim’. Thankfully, even his adrenaline-soaked brain could tell that that was NOT a good idea. But there was... no, he couldn’t...

 _But you have to_ , Dick thought glumly. _Jason thinks you’re some kind of saint. You’re not. If you’re going to own your faults, own them all. No more excuses._

“I killed Joker.”

Dick wasn’t entirely sure what effect he had been going for, but Jason was frozen in shock. The peaches dropped from his hands and followed gravity all the way to the kitchen floor. His breath hitched. Once again, time seemed to slow to a crawl. Then, Jason raised his head and the look of sheer disbelief, shock, and desperate hope, cleaved Dick’s heart in two.

“What?”

“I killed Joker,” Dick repeated as he swallowed the bile the memory brought up. “I thought he had killed Tim and that made me want to put him in a full body cast, but then he started talking about you... trash-talking you... and I just...” Dick closed his eyes for a moment and took a deep breath. “I wanted him gone. It wasn’t fair. He was there. You were not. And he had the damn gall to make fun of it. It wasn’t fair. I wanted him to stop talking. I wanted him to stop breathing. I wanted him to never, ever use your name again. And so I punched him. And punched him. And punched, and punched, and punched... It felt... good. I felt... happy...”

That was perhaps the most frightening thing about it. Dick still remembered it. The exhilaration as his cowl told him that Joker’s vitals were gone. The relief and joy that he would never hurt any of them again.

“I hated myself for that. I hated that I was capable of feeling joy at another living, breathing being’s death... but I was happy he was dead.”

“I take it the asshole revived him?” Jason gave a short, dark chuckle. Dick sighed.

“He doesn’t want any of us to have blood on our hands. He doesn’t want us to carry that kind of burden.”

“There are worse ones to carry,” Jason said tersely. “I’ll take my chances with murder.”

 _And that is the problem_ , Dick wanted to say, but he benched the thought for another day. He hadn’t come here to discuss morality. There was a time and a place for that and it was not now. Not when his brother was going to university, preparing vegetables and what looked like Singapore noodles for dinner. Not when his little brother had a bathroom cabinet full of anti-psychotic drugs and gauze and a closet that looked like an inverted casket. This was a fragile peace and it was not worth sacrificing.

“Jason...” He took another step forward and reached for the wall that separated the living room from the kitchen, the carpet from the tiles, and him from his brother. How he had even made it so far without spooking Jason into _really_ trying to murder him was a mystery to Dick, but he would count his blessings and thank the Lord for them later. “What really happened last year? Between the three of you?”

Another flinch. Jason put the wok on the stove and started with the oil. “It’s none of your business.”

“I think it is,” Dick argued, but he kept his voice as soft as he could. “Because whatever happened had you disappear off the face of the Earth and the next time you appeared, you came to me, wearing my costume, wanting to be my partner.”

“You wouldn’t believe me, even if I told you.” Jason tossed in the onions and sniffled. “Fucking onions.”

“I will believe you, Jason.” Dick rounded the corner into the kitchen carefully. He was either about to get to the bottom of the mystery that had wrecked his brain for the last few weeks, or he was about to get a face full of frying oil. He wasn’t sure which would hurt more. “I know I have an abysmal track record when it comes to honoring my big brother promises with you, but I promise you this: I do want to know and I will not try to downplay it or gaslight you or take sides or anything like that. I’m just going to listen.”

Two minutes of dreadful silence passed. The kitchen was starting to get cloudy with the steam, but Dick suppressed the urge to switch on the hood. He doubted Jason would appreciate any intrusion into his personal space right now. Another minute passed. And another. Jason added two more table spoons of oil, the peas and grated carrots, the sprouts and the noodles and started stirring. His hands trembled faintly.

“I gave him a gun.” Jason all but stabbed the food with the spatula. “I put the other one against Joker’s skull. I told him he could choose: kill Joker, kill me, or let me do the fucking job for him.”

So far, so good. Dick felt something pop inside his chest at the reveal that Bruce hadn’t outright lied to him at least. But he had omitted something. Dick could feel it.

“What did he do to you, Jason?”

Jason paused, put away the egg he had been just about to crack over the noodles, and turned around slowly. His left hand reached for the collar of his Gotham U hoodie and pulled it down just enough to show the scar.

“This.”

It was only one word, but Dick felt it ricochet through every bone and muscle in his body. In the estimated twenty seconds it took him to come up with any reaction other than abject horror and an endless repeat of ‘no no no no no no no no no no no’ in his mind, Jason’s face warped from bravely stoic to that same mixture of pain, sadness, and anger Dick had hear before.

“He threw a batarang—a fucking batarang—into my throat! AND THEN HE LEFT ME THERE!”

The eggs and the packaging of the vegetables was the first thing to go. Jason shoved it off the counter with one powerful swing of his arm. Then he reached for the fruit basket hanging from the ceiling just above the microwave and tossed it to the ground hard enough to split one of the apples. The microwave itself followed and squashed what was left. Then, with a primal scream that Dick had never heard from anything but dying animals before, he opened the drawers next to the hood and started grabbing and smashing the glasses and cups one by one.

“HE! LEFT! ME! TO! DIE!”

By the time it was over, the floor between them was a sea of shards and squished fruits. Through the ever-thicker smoke, Dick could see the tears streaming down his face, hear the sobs that wrecked his body.

“Do you have any idea how hard it is to crawl out of a collapsed building while bleeding from the neck?! Do you know how much blood I lost?! How long it took me to get from there to the nearest pharmacy window to smash and grab some gauze?! He didn’t even look for me, Dick!”

Jason’s hands curled around the protruding edges of the counters to his left and right with enough force to turn his knuckles white.

“He could have found me in a minute. He didn’t even look for me. He just left me to die, Dick. He just left me... for _him_...”

His brain told him to turn tail and run. Dick ignored it and lunged forward, ignored the shards and the mess and everything else, and circled his arms tightly around his brother’s frame. Jason’s head fell against Dick’s shoulder, quickly soaking the overall in cold tears. Somewhere in the back of his mind, Dick registered that Jason was taller than him now, but it didn’t feel right. Not when he was clinging to him like a lifeline, not when he sobbed and choked so hard, Dick was sure he was going to shatter into a million pieces.

He wanted to kill Joker all over again. He wanted to beat the crap out of Bruce.

“He left me...” Jason muttered once more, although the sound was almost swallowed by the heavy fabric of the blue collar. “He left me for him... he left me for Joker, just like he had tried to leave me for you.”

“I doubt I had—“

“We saw it,” Jason cut in quickly. “Blüdhaven. Chemo. He tried to leave.” The sound that forced itself out of Jason’s throat was halfway between crying and laughing. “He was willing to take a one in a million chance of rescuing you... over a two out of three chance of rescuing me.”

The logical part of Dick’s brain wanted to argue, even as his hand reached quickly for the stove controls and shut them off before the apartment would catch fire. A chemical weapon of mass destruction being dropped onto a city was not comparable to one crazy clown strapped to a bomb...

But then again, Chemo had never murdered Dick, but Joker _had_ murdered Jason...

“I don’t get it...” Jason cried softly and he sounded so lost, Dick wasn’t sure if even he knew where he was going with this. “Why? What makes you so special? What did I do wrong? I tried so hard to be a perfect Robin... a good son... Why you, Dick? Why you and not me, for fuck’s sake...”

“I wish I knew...” Dick mused, even as he crouched down gently, following Jason’s momentum as he crumbled in on himself and thank God that microwave was on the floor, because the last thing he needed was for Jason to sit down on a bed of jagged glass. “All I know is he can be a colossal prick and I’m gonna beat him black and blue to match my uniform next time I see him.”

Jason scoffed and wiped the tears off his face with back of his sleeve. His eyes were red and swollen, his cheeks puffed, and his lips trembling, but the tiniest spark of defiance had returned to his eyes. “Then what are you waiting for? You know where he lives. Go get him, you perfect son of a bitch.”

“I’m not perfect,” Dick said carefully. “Not by a long shot. Just look at how many mistakes I’ve made while dealing with you.” Jason quirked his eyebrows, as if to ask him if he was serious. Dick rolled his eyes. “I’ve been a terrible brother to you, but I learned a lot from my time with Tim. I’m not gonna make the same mistakes twice, okay? This time, I’m gonna be there for you. And as much as I would love to go and beat up Bruce right now, it’s gonna have to wait, because there’s something more important to take care of right now.”

“The fact that I just trashed my own kitchen?” Jason winced as the extent of the damage seemed to sink in. “If you’re worried about someone calling the cops, abusive jerk next door put his girlfriend in a coma last week and no-one bothered to call 911. They ain’t giving half a rat’s ass.”

“I’m talking about you, Jason,” Dick said with a rueful smile. He squeezed his brother’s shoulder gently and felt the tension in the muscle all but drain away. “Go grab a shower.” He gave a quick glance at the wok and cringed. “I’ll clean this up and order some takeout for the two of us.”

Dick got up slowly and tried to banish the thoughts of what his next visit to the manor would be like from his brain. He had to focus. Bruce didn’t need him. Tim was doing well enough on his own. Cass was _probably_ fine. But Jason... was the one person who should definitely not be alone right now, judging from the way he all but shambled off to the bathroom, looking very much like he had just risen from the grave once more. In a way, Dick supposed he had. Clancy had been right. Bruce’s choice had killed him.

“You sure you don’t wanna piss off and go home?” Jason asked tentatively as he crossed the threshold to the bedroom. Dick shook his head.

“Gotham is my home, Jason. Yours, too. I’m glad we’ve both come back.”

**Author's Note:**

> In case anyone is wondering, Jason is studying Biochemistry because he's trying to figure out what the Lazarus Pit did to his brain (and how to stop the psychotic episodes it causes).


End file.
